Wales head coach Alan Caron has made two changes to his eight-player squad to face Ireland in the second round of the Wheelchair Rugby League World Cup at WIN Entertainment Centre in Wollongong on Tuesday (kick-off 4pm local, 5am GMT).
Birmingham Hurricanes duo Lee Sargent and Andrew Higgins are selected by Caron, who is also their club head coach, after being in last week’s squad as reserves, with John Berriman and Fionn McCabe being rested.
Higgins is Wales top points scorer with 511 in 37 matches, but joined the squad later than everyone else after returning from his current base in San Francisco.
Two goals for Higgins will take him up to 150 for Wales, whilst vice-captain Stuart Williams is just one try off 75 for his country.
Gareth Ramsey and Martin Turner come into the squad as reserves, and one of them will be named as ninth player, only to be used if there are head injuries. If this does happen, they’ll play alongside their son, with Sid Ramsey and Matthew Turner both retaining their places.
Matthew Turner, who is just two tries short of 50 this season for club and country, turns 17 years old on matchday.
Captain Jodie Boyd-Ward wins her 49th international cap, and if selected on Friday against USA will become the first wheelchair player to reach the half-century. Whilst this match will be her 20th match for Wales, she has previously won seven for Ireland and 22 for England.
This is the 18th meeting between Wales and Ireland, with Wales winning 10 of the previous 17 (with one draw), including a victory in the 2013 World Cup.
However, Ireland have won the last three encounters and go into this match as Celtic Cup holders after edging out Wales 50-38 in May.
“I think we’ve had to redevelop ourselves,” said Wales head coach Alan Caron.
“When I came in there were a number of changes to playing players and we’ve had to adapt and looked at developing these players from grassroots level upwards and, and I think we, we’re seeing that with the calibre of player that are coming through, they’ve been integrated slowly into the competition.
“Ireland have won the last three, but the games have been getting closer over the last couple of years. Hopefully we can achieve our overall goal tomorrow and take a step further to the semi-finals.”
Caron has said the squad rotation is important in this World Cup, with five matches in the space of a fortnight.
“Lee Sargent has had a really good season with the Hurricanes and he’s played really well in the Welsh League with Cardiff too,” Caron said.
“Andrew Higgins has been playing overseas in the US, and he came back and played in the Championship this summer which also worked out really well.
“We’ve had 12 players come out to Australia. We’d like everybody to be able to play at some point and we’ve got that journey of getting to that semi-final.
“But if we don’t get to there, we’ve actually got other games from a ranking point of view, so it’s about making sure that that will that will happen and no injuries occur.
“The last thing we want is to have a player come in that may have a minor injury and then all of a sudden he’s out for the rest of the tournament due to an injury on the pitch.”
The match is being broadcast live on 7+ in Australia and Premier Sports in a lot of the world including Wales.
WALES SQUAD TO FACE IRELAND
1 Sid Ramsey (Sheffield Eagles, 3 Wales caps)
3 Lee Sargent (Midlands Hurricanes / Cardiff Blue Dragons, 8 Wales caps)
4 Andrew Higgins (Birmingham Hurricanes, 37 Wales caps)
5 Jodie Boyd-Ward (Leeds Rhinos, 19 Wales caps)
6 Jonathan Gill (North Wales Crusaders, 2 Wales caps)
7 Stuart Williams (Edinburgh Giants / North Wales Crusaders, 37 Wales caps)
9 Matthew Turner (Wigan Warriors / North Wales Crusaders, 3 Wales caps)
10 Mark Williams (Wigan Warriors / South Wales Jets, 43 Wales caps)
Reserves
8 Gareth Ramsey (Sheffield Eagles, 0 Wales caps)
12 Martin Turner (North Wales Crusaders, 2 Wales caps)
